Editorial, Hits and Misses:

POLLUTION REDUCER Scotts Valley-based Zero Motorcycles, makers of all-electric, no-emission motorbikes, is hitting on all cylinders, so to speak. The company has long painted a picture of its environmentally friendly bikes as the future face of motorcycles. Well, the company got a big boost last month when the Monterey Bay Unified Air Pollution Control District awarded funding from a tax on vehicle license fees to help four area police departments buy electric motorcycles. The grants were also a win for the Capitola, Watsonville, UCSC and Scotts Valley police departments, which will share the grants and start recasting their fleets with cleaner-energy vehicles. And it's a win for the public, as the electric bikes reduce the number of gas-consuming, polluting public vehicles on local roads. The Scotts Valley Police Department, incidentally, already has two Zero Motorcycles, and was the first department in the U.S. to use one.

BIG GOALS UC Santa Cruz had a big week last week. Not only did the university unveil a $300 million fundraising campaign -- along with the news that the campus already has raised about $150 million since the campaign unofficially started four years ago -- UC President Janet Napolitano made her first official visit to the campus. Throw in the popular Ed Talks, which drew a crowd of 200 people to the Top of the Ritt in downtown Santa Cruz, and the UCSC Founders Celebration Dinner on Friday, and it was an eventful week for the 48-year-old City on the Hill. Napolitano was met with some small protests during her Santa Cruz visit, based mainly on her enforcement of the nation's immigration policy in her former role as director of Homeland Security. It seems off-base to blame her for doing her job. If activists felt the need to highlight something, we'd rather it had been the danger of escalating tuition costs in the system, which are pushing higher education out of the reach of many young Californians. We wish Napolitano luck in her stated goal of keeping the taxpayer-funded system in reach of family budgets.

MISSES

STIFF SENTENCE Cheating the system doesn't pay. Just ask Aptos construction firm owner Jeff Thranow. The 59-year-old owner of Costa Bella Builders chose to stop paying payroll taxes and workers compensation insurance, and on Friday he was handed a one-year jail sentence for felony insurance fraud. Two of his company's employees also were convicted, and Thranow has paid nearly $115,000 in restitution. A tip apparently set the investigation in motion. State officials discovered the firm decided to sidestep the mandated costs by paying employees in cash. That leaves workers on the outside looking in should they actually be hurt on the jobsite. We certainly doubt Costa Bella is the only local business trying to cheat the system. Thranow's sentence should be a reminder to any business owner of what can happen if they do.

SHAKY DECISION Coming on the heels of the 24th anniversary of the Loma Prieta earthquake, which indelibly changed the face of Santa Cruz County, recent news that very few earthquake faults in California have been mapped over the past two decades because of funding cuts is disturbing. The state launched an ambitious campaign in the 1970s to help scientists learn more about the state's seismic activity. But only 23 maps have been drawn since 1991, the Los Angeles Times reported last week, and there haven't been any between 2004 and 2011 because of budget cuts. More than 500 maps were published over a 20-year period beginning in 1971. State officials estimate there are still roughly 300 maps to draw and even more to revise. Why should you care? Because new construction atop faults is only banned on faults that have been formally mapped by the state. It certainly makes sense to keep new structures away from dangerous areas straddling faults.